Saturday night palsy

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English

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Etymology

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Introduced mistakenly as a simplification of saturnine palsy, a complication of lead poisoning which has a similar presentation.[1]

Folk etymology associates it with carousing and intoxication on Saturday nights, which causes the individual to fall asleep in unnatural positions, such as on a chair or bed with one arm hanging over the edge.

Noun

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Saturday night palsy (uncountable)

  1. (medicine, informal) Paralysis due to radial nerve compression in the arm, resulting from direct pressure against a firm object.

Hyponyms

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Translations

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References

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  1. ^ Spinner RJ, Poliakoff MB, Tiel RL (2002) “The origin of "Saturday night palsy"?”, in Neurosurgery, volume 51, number 3, pages 737–741